


Party Foul

by avidbowheroes (detour)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-07
Updated: 2013-11-07
Packaged: 2017-12-31 17:43:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1034530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/detour/pseuds/avidbowheroes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's election night, and Stiles is a speechwriter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Party Foul

 

During the speech, Stiles doesn’t pay too much attention. There’s a bunch of stale but still edible sandwich triangles in the greenroom, and everyone pretty much ignores him in turn with the coverage playing on the tv. His words sound good, just the right combination of earnestness and pride that comes from months of candidate coaching.

Scott’s in one of the plastic folding chairs, slumped forward onto a table while he chews blankly on a straw. He’s at least focused in the direction of the tv, barely flinching when Stiles punches his shoulder.  

“Shh,” Scott says, like he hasn’t already heard this speech six ways from Sunday. He’s mouthing the words whether he realizes it or not.

Stiles rolls his eyes and looks at the room. Everyone’s exhausted from the final push to Election Day, capital letters. There are people in the room he doesn’t even know the name of anymore, but everyone’s wearing the same rumpled uniform of untucked shirts and loose ties.  Sensible black heels have been kicked off underneath the tables that have drifted across the middle of the room with a single pair of mens’ dress shoes.

The dress shoes belong to Stiles, no mystery there. His socks are striped pink and yellow, and unfortunately not the party’s colours. They clash with his tie, a blue fashionably darker than the almost-navy of his suit. It echoes the way they’ve all been dressed the entire time, a sign of solidarity that’s gone down along with the buttons.

Even with the hours they’ve put in, Stiles feels his mind wandering, thinking about how much they probably paid the venue’s catering for what now tastes like stale sandwiches, warm egg salad and soft, wet lettuce that turns his stomach as he forces himself to swallow. Maybe they were good once upon a time, when there was more choice than just egg and dry looking cheese. He remembers fondly his internship with the governor’s office, when he was allowed to suggest wording for the fourth and fifth paragraphs of press releases like that’d mean something. In return there were salads with ingredients he couldn’t pronounce, more wine than even a group of earnest new poli sci grads could drink—

Everyone in this room is frozen, though, drawing his attention back to the television. Isaac’s leaning forward over the podium, one hand gripping the close edge in a move Scott totally ripped from a movie. It works here though, makes Isaac seem approachable and earnest and optimistic in one smooth movement. It doesn’t hurt that his face still looks like he’s about to light candles at the front of church on Christmas morning, not at this stage of the run.

This is where Stiles notices— “That’s not my speech.”

“Shh,” Scott says, switching the straw from one side of his mouth to the other. “Speech.”

“No, that’s not,” Stiles says, because what Isaac says then is _werewolf_ and Stiles has never ever dreamed of any typo with such catastrophic consequences before. The crowd is instantly buzzing, and Stiles thinks he can see the head of security stepping forward on Isaac’s left—no, his right, Stiles’ left—and the familiar bellow of the now-redundant previous delegate’s protest comes in overtop of Isaac’s voice.

Everyone in the room starts moving around like it’s going to help, putting plates down and throwing back the last of their drinks, and Stiles still can’t move. He can barely hear Isaac over everything else, thanking everyone for their support of him as a werewolf American—before he’s mercifully cut off and the feed cuts to a startled news reporter in front of a greenscreened image of the venue.

“Shit,” Stiles says. He doesn’t resist when Scott grabs him by the arm, taking him out of the room and into the hallway where it’s cooler and quiet, without any panicking aides.

“No, that was awesome,” Scott says, looking awake for the first time in weeks. “I had no idea, shit, Stiles. That’s going to open everything, you know that?”

Now of all things Stiles is at a loss for words, but it’s probably for the best, since he can see Isaac’s security team at the other end of the hall and the roar of the crowd in the room beyond. Isaac looks pleased as anything, eyes sparkling even as he stumbles underneath the weight of Boyd’s arm.

“What the hell,” Stiles says, once he’s sure they’re out of earshot, Isaac gone into the ready room they’d been prepping in since the results rolled in. It was easier then, a blissful time of crafting a few lines of condolences for Argent on the loss of her seat. Even under the watchful eye of Isaac’s smoking hot head of security it was a better time than right now, while Stiles tries not to panic at the thought that everyone here thinks that this was all his idea.

“Snap out of it,” Scott says, digging his fingers into Stiles’ shoulder. “Dude, it’s fine. You did good. It sounded good, Isaac looked good.”

“I didn’t,” Stiles gets out before self-preservation makes him snap his mouth shut. He’s not sure if he’s more shocked or annoyed at the lame ending to the speech. He gets that Isaac would do it now for maximum press saturation. Every political writer with an interest in the election is connected to the room in some way, and even if it forgets about the boost they need in two weeks during the inevitable dip in numbers, Stiles can get behind the strategy.

He just doesn’t get why Isaac would pass up the obvious and classic American Werewolf for the weaker identity label of Werewolf-American, like the two exist separately. If he finds out who was behind this they’re going to have words—unless it’s the also super hot PR coordinator that Stiles has yet to speak to because of the sheer hotness. It’s a real problem he has around here.

They’re still in the hallway when Isaac’s head of security comes out of the ready room. Stiles is not ashamed to admit he uses Scott like a shield, trying to duck behind him so they don’t get caught in the crossfire.

It doesn’t work, because Laura gets maybe three feet away from them with her nostril flaring before she turns and zeroes in. Scott stays in front of Stiles, bless him, but it’s like Laura doesn’t even notice him.

“You,” she says, one hand on her hip, where Stiles is nearly certain she carries her gun. It’s kind of pathetic that he doesn’t see this as a deterrent to how hot she is. “The speechwriter?”

“Um,” Stiles says. His brain is still on a fifteen second delay. He’s only glad he hasn’t mentioned how hot she is to her face, not yet at least.

“You wrote his speech?” Laura says, then holds up a hand before she tries again. “You’re the one who completely fucked his security for the next three weeks?”

“Wha, no,” Stiles gets out, before his brain gets derailed by the idea of fucking the security team because they are all super hot and worth the couple seconds to consider the idea. Three weeks, god, Stiles would break something.

Laura makes a face likes he knows exactly what Stiles is imagining. “Did it even occur to you, with every right wing nut or Argent supporter getting their rifle together to take him down, that this is possibly a _problem_?”

“Well,” Stiles says, dragging the word out long enough to realize he’s about to say something stupid, but not long enough to stop himself. “Good thing we didn’t also include a how-to on killing werewolves, so it’s not like we went down in flames.”

Laura freezes, holding herself still enough that Scott stiffens in response. She narrows her eyes. “What exactly do you know about werewolves?”

This time Stiles is smart enough not to open his mouth. Scott isn’t, knocking his shoulder into Stiles’ chest in an attempt to get in front of him, and he’s about to say something stupid. Even though werewolf employment law is a hot subject in the media right now, it’s hot because non-werewolf employers can fire people like Scott for no good reason and just sit out the legal battle because of a disappointing lack of past precedent to fast track the ruling.

Laura’s attention is on Scott then, both of them standing up straight, hackles raised like two cats about to fight. Stiles does not want to step between them, but it looks like he’ll have to.  

“Enough,” super hot PR guy cuts in, before Stiles can open his mouth and make it even worse. Stiles goes absolutely speechless in the realm of such glory, although he’s pretty sure it means Derek has no idea what Stiles even does around here.

Laura arches one eyebrow, finally relaxing out of the odd stiffness she’s held since Stiles started speaking. It’s strange that she doesn’t exactly see Derek as much of a threat as Stiles for whatever reason.

“It wasn’t the speech,” Derek says. He gestures back towards the ready room. “Isaac went off book.”

Rolling her eyes, Laura lifts a hand to stop him from continuing. It seems more playful than threatening. “We’ll be talking about this at home.”

“Of course we will,” Derek says, and stands there until Laura makes the motions of moving back to her security team to debrief or whatever it is that the security team does other than stand around looking tough and gorgeous. There’s a kind of familiarity between them that makes Stiles wonder again how there is a whole team feeling that excludes like, him and Scott and the rest of the interns.

“She should leave you alone now,” Derek says to the wall, so it takes Stiles a second to realize that it’s actually being spoken to him.

“Thanks,” Scott says. There’s a bit of that nasally tone in his voice, though, the one where Stiles really wants to punch him because he’s being a little sarcastic but not enough to fully commit to it. It’s the same tone that got them stuck watching speeches forever with the first year interns because no, they didn’t want to watch the live feed with the rest of the PR team. Scott’s not even a good spellchecker, Stiles has no idea why they’re friends.

“You’re welcome,” Derek says, this time with a short glance at Stiles, but kind of sharp like he thinks the silence is deliberate.

Which is not cool, because Stiles is kind of halfway in love with his job even though apparently his plan is not the same as PR’s master plan. They really should be the same plan, Stiles figures, but whatever problem Scott has with Derek screwed that up when they first joined team Lahey. If it wasn’t for that, Stiles might have had some idea of this, enough to keep werewolf-American from becoming every major news network’s favourite soundbite.

Stiles still can’t say anything to Derek without choking on his own tongue, it seems, because he’s staring like an asshole.

Taking a step back, Derek mutters something under his breath when he turns away, something about brick walls and idiots. There’s no good way to take that, and Stiles is okay with people thinking he’s shy but less okay with them thinking he’s stupid.

“Wait, no,” Stiles says. “No, I am not welcome.”

Pausing in his retreat, Derek blinks once. “Huh?”

This is the point where Scott bolts, because he’s smarter than Stiles gives him credit for. Stiles shakes this thought off, and focuses on the corner of Derek’s stupid, half-open mouth. Half-open in dumbness, Stiles thinks meanly, and not in the more likely surprise.

He gestures towards the space where Scott used to be. “Whatever, I am not grateful for whatever that was!”

“It was me saving your ass,” Derek half-snarls, obviously misunderstanding what Stiles is objecting to.

It’s not the rescue, Stiles is legit grateful for that. Less so for whatever PR decided to do to his speech. Stiles should have expected, since no one really gets what he’s saying until they’ve met him at least eighteen times or are Scott, and even that’s hit or miss.

“Yeah, no—” Stiles starts to say, but loses track of his thought when he notices how closely they’re standing together.

Derek flattens his lips in irritation and Stiles shouldn’t be paying attention to that, because he’s not being held responsible for that travesty of a closer—

“Hey, no,” Stiles says, suddenly bold enough to grab at Derek’s sleeve, and of course his shirt is black because heaven forbid PR actually follow the recommendations they set out for everyone else.

“What.” Derek says tiredly.

“I just don’t get it.” Stiles really doesn’t get how Derek is supposedly this PR mastermind, since he barely strings eight words together at a time. Although Stiles really shouldn’t judge since he’s only just rediscovered his own vocal prowess. “Why now?”

“Why not,” Derek says, and looks down the hallway when the ready room door creaks open a little. He starts walking in that direction, but slow enough that Stiles thinks it’s an invite to keep talking.

“Well, winning the seat should carry enough momentum on its own,” Stiles says, half to himself. “And now if numbers drop we have nothing to fall back on—”

“He won as a werewolf, people should know,” Derek says. He’s carefully not looking at Stiles. “If support drops into the negatives tomorrow, at least tonight’s history.”

Stiles realizes his mouth is hanging open as Derek holds the door open to the ready room. That was the most beautiful soundbite he’s heard tonight, and that includes hearing Isaac read his own speech. He closes his mouth, back to the stunned feeling and none of the self-righteous indignation left.

Derek’s gained a few feet of distance between them, speaking over his shoulder. “It’ll also make the statement about his secret relationship in three weeks draw attention away from werewolves and towards his support of same-sex marriage—”

“Wait, what?” Stiles says, stopping short just inside the room.

Derek shrugs. “You really should come to meetings.”

Stiles just stares after him, Derek who’s suddenly smiling and charming and scaring the shit out of Stiles again. He can’t say anything when Isaac spots him and thanks him for the speech, apologizing for the adlib ending. All he can do is nod dumbly, staring as Derek works the room and looks fantastic because he’s funny too, and Stiles knows that he’s done for. Absolutely done.


End file.
